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The conviction upon which this Institute is founded is that twenty-first century America faces a profound moral crisis, which manifests itself in a variety of deep social fissures and public policy problems. We believe that the impotence of public policy regarding many of these problems is connected with a loss of understanding of the principles of the Constitution and, broadly, of the original "American public philosophy". This loss of understanding is most clearly seen in the more or less conscious choice of the most influential intellectuals in America (and those whose views they affect substantially, such as the media elite) to reject the political theory on which the United States was founded. In particular, they reject the more classical and Christian elements, especially from the "natural law" tradition, broadly conceived, of the original American public philosophy, which served to provide it with a solid moral grounding.
The public philosophy on which this nation was founded aimed at limited but effective government--effective not only in providing essential services, but also in helping to maintain the moral integrity of the culture and supporting the institutions (e.g., families and churches) which bear the primary responsibility for the inculcation of civic virtue, an essential condition for a healthy community. One element of this public philosophy was a principle which is sometimes called subsidiarity, which manifested itself in the American constitutional scheme primarily in the doctrine of federalism. A strong national government was intended to guarantee national security and a free national economy, unencumbered by interstate economic conflict. States and local governments were to retain the primary responsibility for administering ordinary civil and criminal law, providing welfare services, and maintaining the moral framework of social life. Over time, this framework of government successfully met challenges, including the elimination of slavery, the integration of countless immigrants into our national life, an expanding national economic life, and the emergence of the nation as an international power. The moderate liberalism of America's public philosophy served the country well for many years of expanding freedom, decency, and prosperity.
American public philosophy has, at least since the 1960s, however, faced a significant challenge, from a competing set of ideas that claims (wrongly, we believe) to be rooted in the Constitution and our national life. Contemporary liberalism, in theory and practice, has more and more retreated from recognizing the obligation of the nation to protect "the moral ecology" and the mediating institutions on which it primarily depends. In the name of an illusory neutrality on questions of the human good, it has undermined the family, by denying its special status in law and by frequently displacing it in its social welfare programs, and it has driven religion out of an expanding public sphere, denying in principle the legitimacy and wisdom of acknowledging God's place in our public philosophy--a place universally acknowledged by those who founded our nation. In its emphasis on personal autonomy, contemporary liberalism has fostered ever-expanding forms of rights and entitlements, while ignoring or downplaying the moral ideals and duties which give meaning and reasonable limits to those rights. Far from representing our national ideals, this philosophy is antithetical to them.
These changes gravely endanger the well-being of our nation. For us, then, the effort to understand and defend the principles of the American republic is crucial as a precondition for re-establishing them once more as the foundation of our national life.
At the same time, this project is not simply a "restorationist" one. Articulating a public philosophy is an on-going task. We do not pretend that the public philosophy on which the United States was founded was completely adequate. Both its intrinsic limitations and the changes of circumstances in the last two centuries require creative efforts to reformulate that original public philosophy, to improve it and render it adequate to the exigencies of our own time. But that reformulation will have in common with the original American public philosophy the purpose of drawing on the broad natural law tradition to provide the best possible vision of civic purposes for our modern pluralist community.
One could legitimately say that this is no "mere academic task". It will require statesmen capable of translating the essential elements of a renewed American public philosophy into terms that the American people can understand and will want to embrace. At the same time, since a restoration of those principles requires that they be re-discovered, defended, corrected at times, and applied to modern circumstances, it is also fair to say that academic study and exposition are crucial elements of the project of restoring the American republic. The Institute hopes to make an important contribution to that intellectual task.
The Institute undertakes a variety of activities which help to foster a better understanding of American public philosophy, and especially of those elements of it which draw on the natural law. It especially sponsors conferences on subjects at the intersection of legal philosophy, natural law theory, American political thought, and contemporary liberal theory. From the interchange of opinion thereby fostered, the Institute hopes to contribute to a deeper understanding of the principles of the American constitutional order and to an elevation of political discourse in American life.
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